News Round-Up

Some random news bits, in no particular order:

• I slept for about two hours last night, so I am feeling HORRIBLE and CRANKY and exhausted to the point of nausea. (Does anyone else get nauseous when they are exhausted?) Ever since my utterly humiliating middle-of-the-night e-mail to Dr. T, I've become super paranoid about Ambien, and it's not even working very well, so I decided to try not taking it when I don't have anything of huge consequence the next day. Last night was the beginning of this little experiment. Instead of Ambien, I took a melatonin + Belsomra, and it did nothing. I went to bed by 10:30 and tossed and turned and scratched until 4:30 AM. 4:30 AM. I caught a few hours of dozing time in approximately half-hour increments between 4:30 and 7:00. But man. This has to stop. I can't even nap anymore. I keep thinking I have to reach a point of exhaustion where I just crash, but that doesn't happen. After dropping my son off at day care and my daughter off at gymnastics camp, I went up to work and mostly just sat there and stared at the computer until 12:55. Then I went to pick my daughter up and took her out to lunch, and almost fell asleep during lunch. But when we got home, I tried to take a nap and I couldn't. I repeat: This has to stop. Maybe tonight I will try melatonin + Benadryl.
• Preparing for the upcoming semester has been a good distraction, but also extremely annoying. One of my colleagues is covering the first six weeks of two of my classes for me, so I need to coordinate with her. Unfortunately, she is a new hire and is not being very responsive to any of my correspondence, which is extremely nerve-wracking. Technically, new faculty are not actual employees until August 17th, which is ridiculous, because that's a week before classes start, but basically there is nothing that anyone can do to force her to respond. I keep telling myself that if this isn't resolved before I go for surgery, it's not problem, only... it is.
• Something that has been in the back of my mind is the results of the PET scan I had done way back when. When I saw the first medical oncologist, Dr. U, she suggested that my uterus was of concern and that I needed a pelvic ultrasound. No doctor since then has brought this up, so I conveniently forgot about it - only I didn't really. I meant to ask Dr. L about it at my last visit with her, but then I ended up bawling the whole time and never did. I'm not sure if this is something that has just gotten overlooked or if it's something that isn't of real concern. Dr. U did say that it could just be my period, but that we would need to know for sure. I was supposed to schedule an ultrasound when I went back to see her, but I never went back to see her. So... I e-mailed Dr. L about it, asking her if she thought this was necessary, and if so, who did this sort of thing. If it was an OB/GYN, could she recommend an OB/GYN who could deal with cancer AND OB/GYN stuff? Regardless, I feel like I need a good OB/GYN about now, especially since I'll be messing with my hormones very soon, increasing my chances of uterine cancer, killing off my girl parts one by one, etc. And while I love Dr. M, I'm not psyched about him looking up my katonga, if he even does that sort of thing. I figured Dr. L is a female doctor with kids, so she must have an OB/GYN she likes. Of course I didn't ask her who she sees, just for a recommendation. She wrote me the sweetest response, which I would share, but it was actually fairly personal, so I feel like it would be some sort of violation of something. Like... choosing to blab all of my own personal information here is one thing, but sharing others' is another. At any rate, she did say that in her opinion, the results of the PET were very consistent with me just having my period, but that I should bring it up with Dr. M. She said I definitely needed a good OB/GYN and gave me her recommendation. So that's that.
• My husband and I spent about two hours each yesterday dealing with a bill that we never got (and therefore never paid) that was supposedly going to a collection agency. There is some ridiculous story involving our insurance that I won't go into, but all this freaking ado over a bill for, like, $30. And apparently the same thing happened last year with the same folks, and the bill did go to collections, so my credit is pretty much f-ed up over a $16 bill from last May that I never got and therefore never paid. WTF?
• Because we don't have enough to deal with, my husband managed to tear his meniscus in his sleep. Okay, so it's doubtful he actually did it in his sleep, but he literally just woke up one morning, about a month ago, and said his knee hurt. I pretty much ignored him like I usually do, because I'm a self-centered bitch, and he has been known to whine excessively on occasion. Only it kept hurting, like a lot, and I figured it was pretty bad around the time he stopped showing off all his fancy dives at the swim club. Eventually he went to see an orthopedist - actually the same orthopedist who told me I needed PAO surgery - and what do you know, he's not faking it. Great, just great. 

So in conclusion, in case you couldn't tell, I am suuuuuuper cranky pretty much all the time right about now, even worse than normal, and trust me, that is saying a lot. I'm hoping that my appointment with Dr. Awesome Anticoagulation Hematologist puts my mind back at ease and helps allay some of this horrible anxiety so I can stop being such a jerk, or at least stop seeing everyone else as a stupid jerk. LOL. In the meantime, if I could just get some sleep, that would be seriously awesome.

Ambien Zombie

I feel like I sort of left things hanging with the post before the last one, so I should at least write a follow-up to that. While I was driving my daughter home from gymnastics camp just a few minutes ago, I was thinking of when we moved here six years ago, and were going through a very worrisome time due to her significant developmental delays. For the first three years of her life, we took numerous trips to various specialists, including a pediatric cardiologist. (Talk about a depressing waiting room.) A while ago, I was trying to recall the specific details of those visits, so of course I consulted my blog. Nothing. Nothing except a vague reference to the fact that I had gone to the pediatric cardiologist and didn't feel like writing about it. At the time, I suppose I figured I would rally and write about it eventually, but I never did. Now I regret that. I want that time back. I want the details; I want to remember exactly what I was feeling at the time, other than distraught. So I shall sally forth and try to write down as many details as I can now, because someday I will want them.

To make a long story short: It looks as if the surgery I discussed with Dr. T on 7/15 is a go. I am planning on it, with cautious optimism.

To make a short story long: Remember how I have not been able to sleep? How I went to see my PCP to get a prescription for Ambien? Well, apparently my anxiety levels are so high that even Ambien doesn't do the trick. It definitely helps, but even with a melatonin + Ambien cocktail + scarf over my eyes + earplugs, I'm lucky to get five hours of uninterrupted sleep. And once I wake up from whatever sleep the aforementioned give me, it's all over. There is no going back to sleep for any significant amount of time - just dozing for maybe half an hour at a time or so.

One night last week, I woke up around 1 AM sweating and itching and was convinced I was experiencing early onset menopause, but that's a different story. The next night, I didn't want to mess around, so I drank a huge glass of wine with my Ambien and fell asleep while watching Harry Potter with my kids. I remember waking up at the end to go to the bathroom and help my husband get the kids to bed, going to sleep, and waking up with a horrible Ambien + wine hangover. I staggered into the office to check my e-mail before the kids got up. I had an e-mail from Dr. T. It said:

Waning,

I am confident that we can make the surgery happen. I am a very safe surgeon and do a very thorough preoperative evaluation. I want to make certain that we do this for you without causing any problems and I definitely don't want you to have another blood clot.

Rest assured. 

Ty Tahm, MD

Confused, I scrolled down. To my horror, I discovered that somehow, in the middle of the night, I had sent him a horrible, panicky, anxiety-filled e-mail that is so embarrassing I can't even paste its contents here. I pretty much told him if he was going to back out on me, to tell me now. I needed to know.

Holy shit.

I promptly Googled 'side effects of Ambien' and came across this article, which made me feel a little better. So Ambien really can make you do crazy shit, apparently. At least I didn't kill anyone, just HUMILIATED myself. Although, oddly enough, my e-mail was extremely coherent. Everything I said was certainly what was on my mind, it just needed editing to not be so overbearingly forward and presumptuous. I even told Dr. T about all the reading I had been doing on PubMed about hemoglobin E, including: There do not seem to be any clinical issues being heterozygous E or even homozygous EE, unless in combination with another mutation. The concern you spoke to me about was with patients whose spleens had been removed, but in reading through the literature, it seems those patients had splenomegaly because they had hbE + another abnormal hemoglobin.

OMGIWANTTODIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!

I didn't even know splenomegaly was in my vocabulary. Apparently it's a real thing, though. See? http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/enlarged-spleen/basics/definition/con-20029324

Let me just repeat: OMGIWANTTODIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!

I replied:

Dr. Tahm,

Thank you for the reassurance. I appreciate your thoroughness. I am always trying to prepare myself for the worst case scenario (and there have been several over the past two months). And sorry for the panicky e-mail... I have been taking Ambien so I can sleep after two months of not really sleeping, and apparently it makes me write middle-of-the-night crazy e-mails. Yikes.  

If there were a sheepish emoticon, I would have added that, but honestly, what else can you do?

But, when all is said and done, the reassurance is good. I just pray the next time I see Dr. T, I'll be unconscious already. So I guess I should change that to: I just pray the next time Dr. T sees me, I'll be unconscious already.

Can this nightmare be over already?! Oh wait, you have to sleep to have nightmares. This is real. This. is. real. Unbelievably, horribly real.